Thanks to copyright trolls like this guy[wired.com], we're going to have to change the way that you guys share news articles here in the Podium. To make a long story short, a lot of the stuff that gets posted in here is theoretically protected by the newspaper/magazine/website's copyright. This hasn't been much of an issue in the past, because most publishers simply appreciate the attention (and can't argue that the value of the copyright is being damaged with a straight face). Unfortunately, it seems as though the goal of these copyright trolls isn't to actually win a big lawsuit, but to force smaller sites to settle instead of hiring an expensive attorney to defend. Given the overriding principles of Slickdeals, you can imagine that we don't aim to rack up unnecessary attorney fees.

So, in response to this- we're establishing a new policy for pasting and linking articles:

From now on, posts should include the title of the original article, a link to the article, and your take (your own summary if you choose). Posts SHOULD NOT INCLUDE LARGE BLOCKS OF TEXT FROM THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE. You can still quote from the article, but only use what you need to make your point (you guys are kind of doing this now by bolding particular parts- just quote what you might otherwise have bolded). Also, please err on the side of under-quoting.

I know that this will make things a little tougher on OPs, but I really do think that the extra bit of burden will (1) cut down on the number of lazy starts to threads, (2) help establish a focus for the discussions, (3) make threads less intimidating to jump into, and, most importantly, (4) help SD avoid being sued.

A similar note had been posted in the lounge and podium.

*plagiarized almost in whole by Schooby with knowledge and permission of thelnel52.
Thanks

Wrong. An article made available for free on my website does not relinquish my rights as the author. Now if I post the article and provide a release of my rights to the article (think copyleft), then anyone can copy it based on those rights provided. That is no different than if I write a flash game and distribute it. I can distribute it with the standard rights my country offers, or additional rights on my choosing, or I can simply release it into the wild and say anyone can do anything they want with it. There are plenty of free and legal pieces of software out in the wild that you are free to redistribute based on the rights afforded by the author. Something offered for free from the author/publisher does not automagically give you the right to reproduce it, be it software or poetry or an article about a game you like.

They're basically arguing that quoting the entire article goes beyond fair use. Quoting small sections, on the other hand, is fine.

Now that inernet trolls have been defeated in these lawsuits where judges ruled they were fair use since the poster wasn't profiting, maybe we can get rid of this ridiculous rule? The main troll behind this is now having to pay big legal fees for the people he sued.

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